Utah woman claims airline lost her emotional support dog

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SALT LAKE CITY (KUTV) — A Utah woman alleges JetBlue Airlines lost her emotional support dog Friday before her flight was set to leave the Salt Lake City International Airport to Orlando, Florida.

Tali Lisman, daughter of Lilian Ramos, posted on Facebook and notified KUTV 2News that her mother's registered emotional support dog, Phillip, needed to go to the bathroom before departure and was taken by a security official to a relief area.

Her Facebook post stated: "They said he could be taken out by a security person or whoever is in charge of that so the guy took the dog and 10 min later they came back and said 'you need to grab your things and come with us,' they followed, they put her in a room and said 'Your dog escaped from the leash... he ran away, we're sorry, we have people looking for him.' and that was pretty much it."

JetBlue Corporate Communications responded to the allegations in an official statement.

"While boarding Flight 802 from Salt Lake City to Orlando last night, a customer at the gate requested assistance in transporting an emotional support dog to a pet relief area. Our crewmember accommodated the special request, bringing the dog to a post-security pet relief area designated by the airport for use by properly badged airport employees. While in the pet relief area, the dog escaped from its collar and leash and onto the airport operations area."

It continued, "Our crewmembers immediately notified the customer and began a search for the dog with the assistance of the owner as well as local airport authorities. All efforts are being made to find the dog and we continue to work with the customers directly while the search continues."

Lisman is soliciting legal assistance to deal with the matter on behalf of her mother and has started a hashtag campaign for the public's help in finding the lost dog.

"Please, if anyone knows any lawyers please send them my way. This can't be how these situations are handled and there has to be some kind of consequence for this," Lisman stated in her social media post.